Patience
by MasterPassionCreed
Summary: It is not useful, it is vital, they say. Her eyelids close.


___Patience_

Caroline is not calm, not at all.  
They asked her to, but she just can't – even though she knew that it would happen anyway, that it would not be otherwise.  
His voice was clear enough then; yet it was clearer there, in the great Hall, when they nailed him forever to that huge mass of silk and wood. Then she recalled his words and dried her small tears, looking at her duties with doomed eyes. She could not think of anything else – Cave Johnson's coffin was not just pleading her to. It wasn't even a command; it was so much more than that.  
Why would he do something like this, something so terrible, to a worker he had for so long kept by his side? There was no meaning in that. No feelings, no science.  
She walks the white corridors on high heels; she knows it's her death row she's walking to, and yet she tries to be as quiet and efficient as usual. Her cream-coloured dress has the same folds as ever; the red scarves shines on them, refined, soft. She has always had the perfect taste in everything, from scientific experiments to clothing. Her greatest quality, though, is that she is perfectly humble and this is why she is helpless now. Her moves are smooth like water, and her whitening hair follows her steps as she walks. There she is; the white lamb among white wolves.  
She whispers a question to her colleagues, and her lips, bright under their make-up, tremble slightly. She cares to know if this is really necessary, if she will keep being useful to the job she has loved so much.  
It is not useful, it is vital, they say. Her eyelids close.  
It's just the same to her; she has nobody, nothing left to trust. It is for Science – she can surrender and find a glimpse of hope in herself.

Caroline is puzzled and, from there, she does not seem to find a way out.  
The other being sharing her place is not an usual being. She has the ethereal form of a terrible beauty – that's how she must imagine herself as a woman, Caroline guesses. That image, however, has to be a reject of her mind, since it's been stored with her – she, Caroline, has been thrown in the farthest corner of her memory. At least she is shielded from the outer world. She knows what GLaDOS is doing; she presses her hands on her eyelashes and cries in silence – she can because a computer, in any way, would never listen to her prisoner.  
She would do anything not to see how many people are dying outside. Maybe GLaDOS knows what she thinks of her, maybe not – what counts is that she considers the two of them as separate beings. The noble animal, the useless parasite.  
As the weeks melt and flow away, Caroline wonders why she is in there in first place; yet there's no way to find out, and the more days pass the more she fears she'll never have an answer.  
In the end, however, she never loses her hope. And her hope is there, in her very voice; because she sounds cold and merciless to all of them prisoners, but in front of her alone, hidden in that forgotten of data, that creature still cries like a child.

Once again, Caroline is desperate.  
She has already fought once, and then her energies have been drained; neither of them will ever forget how she screamed when the girl first awoke. That was a day of pain for all of them – as hard as GLaDOS tried to stop her, her struggles failed as Caroline tried to get through her test-subject's mind, warning, yelling, desperately patching the neurotoxin apparatus with her virtual ghost fingers. She had seen enough death through her artificial eyes – there was no way she'd eventually let her kill a girl. Such a brilliant, young girl.  
Caroline hates her when she behaves like this. She would love her intelligence, her perfection, if only she weren't so proud – endlessly stubborn, hopelessly refusing to have a human part in herself. However, Caroline sighs and wait patiently; she knows she has already won. As long as GLaDOS will try to, she will never be able to hide her feelings from her.  
Now the girl is awake again, and the games are the same; but that poor child and her robot friend have suffered enough for her tastes. No matter how long she'll have to fight before her words are worth something to her; she'll do her best until the end, so that GLaDOS can finally see what she sees, with a single pair of gentle eyes.  
It is a truth after all; the fact which is so simple, and still she refuses to accept. Without mankind there's little point in science.

Caroline is relieved for the first time in ages.  
She never got to overcome her personality; but it doesn't matter, and it all is better this way.  
Thinking about it, luck was on her side for so long that she can hardly believe it. She slipped in that battery with her, she could manipulate her, change her mind with her words – and maybe this means how deeply she was carved in her, how important she must have been to her existence. Well – she may be dead and trapped in a circuit too, but she can still dream.  
And now everything has changed. Everything is different, anyone could see why.  
She smiles while following her artificial thoughts – they bring GLaDOS exactly where she struggled to lead her. The yellow lenses are focused on the girl alone, as they have been for hours; the way she breathes and trembles, the way she opens her eyes. What was her name again? Chell, wasn't it?  
She sighs. Her half-destroyed memory is unworthy of such a strong name; luckily, GLaDOS does for her, and remembers it better than anything she has ever known about a test-subject.  
She is awake, and GLaDOS starts talking to her. Caroline listens carefully – she kneels in the darkness of her mind, with her pale image of loose hair and sad eyes, waiting for everything to fade in black.  
She knew she'd destroy her one day – the day when, besides being worthless, she'd become too noisy and annoying. But she doesn't value that ghost of existence herself, not any more; all she cared for is now real, and this is much more than enough. One moment before the deletion process, Caroline lets out a quiet laugh. She wants her to feel her last words, no matter what.  
You love her, she tells GLaDOS, smiling kindly. You can't even hide it to yourself.  
When the elevator leaves, however, Caroline quivers in surprise. She is outside, flown on currents of a song; and the three of them – all of them – are still in this world.

* * *

A/N

I swore I'd write about Caroline and her feelings one day. I did at last :3  
I really love her character; she's way stronger than she looks, and surely as obstinate as Chell when she wants things to happen in some way. Although I don't think she actually is her mother, I wouldn't be surprised if she actually were. 3


End file.
